So Effing Close

[MyCarHasAbs]

I think I've discovered a portion of my problem. Just poured the strike water in and I'm waiting for it to get down to the appropriate temp (155 or slightly higher) and it's taking a hot minute to drop from 170.

I was pouring, pitching the grain and goin'. It was probably too damn warm.

 

[MyCarHasAbs]

I took a pre boil gravity reading and I think I hit it pretty close to the mark...I think!?

Big Ben Pale Ale is supposed to be:
SG: 1.044-1.050
FG: 1.012-1.016

I think I hit the pre boil somewhere around the 1.04 marker.

View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1425100864.496114.jpgView attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1425100899.411575.jpg

I fly sparged three times. Only once had the water level up top gone below the surface of the grains. Maybe my efficiency is a bit too low?

 

[Gavin C]

I fly sparged three times. Only once had the water level up top gone below the surface of the grains. Maybe my efficiency is a bit too low?

Fly sparging is a continuous process. It should be only done once to the best of my knowlege and halted once the desired preboil volume is reached or the pH gets too high.

Perhaps I'm missing something and others will correct me.

 

[Subdivisions]

Looks like it's about 1.04

 

[MyCarHasAbs]

Also, (while currently in mid boil) here's where I suspect one issue may be...I'm currently well above 120F. Am I scorching the malt?

This could possibly explain why none of my beers are crystal clear, with the exception of my wheat beer.

 

[MyCarHasAbs]

Looks like it's about 1.04

Is that good or bad?

 

[MyCarHasAbs]

Fly sparging is a continuous process. It should be only done once to the best of my knowlege and halted once the desired preboil volume is reached or the pH gets too high.



Perhaps I'm missing something and others will correct me.

I'll elaborate a little on that note.

I'm using a two cup volume measuring cup to collect sanitized water that's 165+ F and dribbling it over a colander (pasta strainer) until the two inch (approx) marker is met in the mash tun..and closed the lid. I did this a grand total of three times.

Anything off?

 

[MyCarHasAbs]

OH!! Also..I have a digital scale upstairs, because..y'know..I'm getting fat haha and measured the total weight of my grains. It was 11.6 lbs. did the conversion and it came out to 3.625 gallons of water to use for strike. I collected about the same amount.

 

[Gavin C]

I'll elaborate a little on that note.

I'm using a two cup volume measuring cup to collect sanitized water that's 165+ F and dribbling it over a colander (pasta strainer) until the two inch (approx) marker is met in the mash tun..and closed the lid. I did this a grand total of three times.

Anything off?

This is not fly sparging. Also why are you sanitizing things pre boil. This is not needed.

 

[MyCarHasAbs]

Took an SG. looks kinda high to me. This was after adding water to 4 gallons.

View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1425109260.469256.jpg

 

[MyCarHasAbs]

This is not fly sparging. Also why are you sanitizing things pre boil. This is not needed.

Then what is it?

 

[fuelish]

edit....nevermind, I'm cranky LOL

 

[Rotor_Head]

You could be right but I say if you wanna do 10 styles in 10 recipes, do it. If it sucks, age it. If it still sucks, dump it. That's the beauty of it... You do it how you want and learn as you go.

 

[MyCarHasAbs]

To who asked why I'm sanitizing pre boil...


Why not? ?

 

[McKnuckle]

When you boil everything dies. No need to bother sanitizing in advance because boiling does it for you.

 

[tnance1337]

Then what is it?

Fly sparging is a continous sparge where the sparge water is added at a continuous flow rate equal to the rate at which wort runnings are drawn out. You would basically need to pump or gravity feed water slowly as you slowly draw wort out.

 

[Gavin C]

Then what is it?

What you describe does not have a name but would seem to indicate some gaps in your knowledge. The following is taken from Palmer's "How to brew"

What is Sparging?

Sparging is the rinsing of the grain bed to extract as much of the sugars from the grain as possible without extracting mouth-puckering tannins from the grain husks. Typically, 1.5 times as much water is used for sparging as for mashing (e.g., 8 lbs. malt at 2 qt./lb. = 4 gallon mash, so 6 gallons of sparge water). The temperature of the sparge water is important. The water should be no more than 170°F, as husk tannins become more soluble above this temperature, depending on wort pH. This could lead to astringency in the beer.

The wort should be drained slowly to obtain the best extraction. Sparge time varies depending on the amount of grain and the lautering system, .5 - 2.5 hours. Sparging means "to sprinkle" and this explains why you may have seen or heard discussion of "sparge arms" or sprinklers over the grain bed for lautering. There is no reason to fool with such things. There are three main methods of sparging: English, batch and continuous.

In the English method of sparging, the wort is completely drained from the grain bed before more water is added for a second mash and drained again. These worts are then combined. Alternatively, the first and second runnings are often used to make separate beers. The second running is lighter in gravity and was traditionally used for making a Small Beer, a lighter bodied, low alcohol beer suitable for high volume quaffing at mealtimes.

Batch Sparging is a U.S. homebrewing practice where the full volume of sparge water is mixed into the mash. The grain bed is allowed to settle, and then the wort is drained off. The re-circulation step in this process takes place in the first minutes of the sparge. You can use more than one batch of water if you need to. This method differs from the English method in that the mash is not held for any significant time at the saccharification temperature before draining.

Continuous Sparging usually results in better extractions. The wort is re-circulated and drained until about an inch of wort remains above the grain bed. The sparge water is gently added, as necessary, to keep the fluid at least at that level. The goal is to gradually replace the wort with the water, stopping the sparge when the gravity is 1.008 or when enough wort has been collected, whichever comes first. This method demands more attention by the brewer, but can produce a higher yield.

Here is a very informative thread about fly-sparging that you might find useful. https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f36/hybrid-fly-sparge-technique-75454/

Also, regarding the hydrometer measures you show. At least one of the measures you have taken are incorrect. To go from 1.04 preboil to the very high post boil you show following the dilution of the wort with 4 gallons of water would have required a massive boil-off to near LME consistency. It is more likely that the wort was not adequately mixed prior to either the pre-boil, post boil or both readings being taken.

Sanitation: Anything that touches the wort after the boil is complete and the wort has been chilled below a certain temperature should be sanitized. Prior to the boil sanitation is redundant. One of the reasons beer is so ancient is that it is an extremely effective way to make dirty water safe to consume when done correctly. Boiling kills the nasties. You're not going to do any harm by sanitizing preboil items. It's just pointless extra work.

 

[MyCarHasAbs]

1) the video I watched months back is how I initially started AG and THAT'S exactly what the guy was doing..the collander and such. Whatever that's called, that's what I'm doing. I read up on that link you provided though.

2) So my ridiculously high reading...you said it most likely wasn't mixed properly post boil, I assume after everything was mixed with water and two weeks from now I should get a semi normal reading? Also, was the 1.04 reading good or too low?? Side note** the directions never once said to mix the wort after collection. I've been collecting the same volume that I initially strike with. In this case it was 3.625 gal. (and yes I used a calculator after weighing the grains.)

3) Now I'm pissed at the sanitation steps. Every ingredient kit I've ever bought has stressed the urgency of sanitizing your equipment. UGHHHH!! That's probably half a bottle of starsan gone to waste. Part of me kinda knew this..I thought boiling water killed nasties but I was just following directions.

 

[Gavin C]

1 there are as many useless homebrew vids as there are good ones. Probably more. The sprinkling the water though a colander will work but you need to do it constantly for 30-60 minutes depending on the rate of the Sparge.

Doing it 3 times is not effective. It would need to be consistent.

With an all grain brew you typically will not be topping up with water. You are targeting a specific volume and gravity going into the FV. All the water calculations are done with that end in mind. There are exceptions to this but with a preboil of 1.04 that would not apply.

That top up water would be better utilized to Sparge with to bring up your volume and extract more sugars. It is more useful this way. Greater efficiency will result. The top up water if used should be sanitized. I guess I'm confused as to your overall process. It does not sound like an all grain process. With the preboil volume you showed I would expect a post boil of about 1.045. If you added 4 gallons of water that would bring it down to 1.020 ish. Rough estimate. Your reading was so high that the prediluted wort would need to be like syrup.

Why were you diluting the wort. We're you using extract? I'm really not getting it I'm afraid.

 

[MyCarHasAbs]

1 there are as many useless homebrew vids as there are good ones. Probably more. The sprinkling the water though a colander will work but you need to do it constantly for 30-60 minutes depending on the rate of the Sparge.

Doing it 3 times is not effective. It would need to be consistent.

With an all grain brew you typically will not be topping up with water. You are targeting a specific volume and gravity going into the FV. All the water calculations are done with that end in mind. There are exceptions to this but with a preboil of 1.04 that would not apply.

That top up water would be better utilized to Sparge with to bring up your volume and extract more sugars. It is more useful this way. Greater efficiency will result. The top up water if used should be sanitized. I guess I'm confused as to your overall process. It does not sound like an all grain process. With the preboil volume you showed I would expect a post boil of about 1.045. If you added 4 gallons of water that would bring it down to 1.020 ish. Rough estimate. Your reading was so high that the prediluted wort would need to be like syrup.

Why were you diluting the wort. We're you using extract? I'm really not getting it I'm afraid.

Woah, wait..time out. Let me highlight something you said.

With an all grain brew you typically will not be topping up with water.

Are you saying I'm supposed to collect the full 4+gallons of wort from the mashtun?..and that I'm not supposed to add water post boil to the carboy to reach the full volume? If that's so this is a major news flash to me.

I guess I'm confused as to your overall process. It does not sound like an all grain process. With the preboil volume you showed I would expect a post boil of about 1.045. If you added 4 gallons of water that would bring it down to 1.020 ish. Rough estimate. Your reading was so high that the prediluted wort would need to be like syrup.

So besides the fact that I took that reading before mixing the water and the wort, what else would cause the reading to be so high?

And no, I haven't used an extract kit in nearly 8 months.

I think I'm going to start a new thread and just reference this one. 8 pages is getting to be a bit much.

 

[Gavin C]

A planned top up of the wort is not the norm for an all grain process. It is sometimes done but these are the exceptions rather than the rule. The reasons are usually corrective; ie the measured final gravity was a touch high and the brewer wanted to reduce. Or it can be planned due to equipment constraints where the full volume of a very big beer cannot be accommodated in one's boil kettle.

But no in summary a topping up of the wort is not the norm. Sounds like you have misunderstood some steps with regard to all grain brewing.

It would not be true to say that no one tops up but there are significant disadvantages to doing this. As I previously mentioned, that is what the Sparge will do. Increase the volume and extract more sugars.

There is a great video on Northern Brewers BrewTV with John Palmer doing a simple all grain brew utilizing a batch Sparge. I think you might benefit from watching this. I very straight forward demonstration of a very popular all-grain process.

Hydrometer reading for a starting gravity should be taken after all dilutions or additions (except the yeast) have been made. The wort needs to be thoroughly homogenous in order to get a sample that is representative.

I guess if you boiled 3.5 gallons down to 1 prior to adding 4 gallons of water and took the reading before the dilution that might account for the high gravity reading. Once you dilute though you no longer know the gravity. Another measure is needed if the figure is to be of use.

 

[Skiffy]

Please don't take this post the wrong way as I'm trying to figure out the best way to fix your problem. Your enthusiasm and willingness to learn is great; however, I think we, as a whole, are having a hard time communicating. I'm sure none of us claim to be experts, and it's certainly okay to not know or understand, as this is exactly what the forums are for ... but I think you need to take a step back and really learn the basics and read some of the great resources out there on your own.

I feel like I'm talking to a kid that just learned a bunch of big words but doesn't exactly know what they mean ... or I'm talking with a doctor and I'm slowly finding out they actually only have 1 semester of chemistry under their belt. In person, I think these exchanges would be fine, but through text over the forum I think we are having trouble helping you.

Read Palmer's book "How to Brew" (available online) and watch some videos on youtube from Northern Brewer or something. That's how I learned and I'm sure how many others have learned. Cheers.

 

[Gavin C]

Woah, wait..time out. Let me highlight something you said.
Are you saying I'm supposed to collect the full 4+gallons of wort from the mashtun?..and that I'm not supposed to add water post boil to the carboy to reach the full volume?

You should collect your full preboil volume from the mash tun. This will vary from brewer to brewer depending on the rate of boil off and length of boil. As an example, for a 5.5 gallon batch (volume going into the fermentor) I will start with about 7 gallons in the boil kettle. This will be reduced to 5.7 gallons over the course of the boil with 0.2 gallons of trub losses and losses to my plate chiller and hoses. The end result is my target 5.5 gallons in the FV.

During ferment about 0.5 gallons are lost to trub and yeast left in the FV at the time the beer is racked to the keg. Result 5 gallons of beer.

Again John Palmer's How to Brew or the Complete Joy of Homebrewing will cover all this in more detail. The former is free online should you wish to learn some more.

 

[MyCarHasAbs]

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f39/so-effing-close-517283/
Use this for reference incase you need to read the whole thing to get properly caught up. I created a new thread to continue this because I think some were starting to get confused with information.

I'll present some cliff notes of the referenced thread so maybe no one will need to reference it.
To the MODS, sorry if this is inconvenient to post a new thread on the same topic but it made more sense to me to start fresh with condensed topic points so folks don't have to scroll through 9 whole pages to get caught up.

RECAP:

- I was noticing off flavors in my lighter ales.
- I'm doing All Grain.
- Two theories that emerged from others was my water source and I was potentially underpitching.
- Other factors such as temperature doesn't appear to be an issue as I'm using temp controllers.
- The new plan suggested by a few was to brew the same thing three times to become consistent in both the process and possibly pinpointing the culprit behind the off flavors.
- I bought three Big Ben Pale Ale AG kits from Midwest.

RECAP OF BREW DAY (LAST NIGHT/THIS MORNING...3AM..<----not kidding..no seriously, I'm tired as f***):

- Grains weighed 11.6lbs, calculations suggested striking with 3.625lbs gallons of water. I collected the same volume in the form of wort.
- Discovered I may have been pouring the grains in at too high of a temperature. May have been closer to 160 or 165F before I stirred and closed the lid.
- Started taking gravity readings for the first time. Pre boil was 1.04...SG post boil should have been around 1.044ish but for some reason it was very HIGH. This is still a bit of a mystery. Someone suggested it was because the wort hadn't been stirred thoroughly before the reading was taken.
- I rehydrated the dry yeast in a cup of purified water that had been microwaved to approx 95F, and prepped into a cream after about 15-20 minutes.
- Fermentation has started and a krausen is in the early stages of forming. The temp is set to 64.

LAST BUT NOT LEAST:

- There appears to be issues in my sparging process. I watched the following vid on YouTube.
http://youtu.be/1CRI1veziKI <---I thought it made a lot of sense so that's why I went with it.
Some people have been saying what I'm doing is NOT fly sparging. At this point, I don't care what the name of the process I'm doing is called. Technicalities will come later. What this guy does in the video is EXACTLY what I'm doing.
FINALLY: I'm not sure if someone misread info in the last thread or what but now it's being suggested I'm not suppose to top off with water in the carboy to reach full volume. If that's true...then I need a bigger kettle.

 

[Yooper]

Woah, wait..time out. Let me highlight something you said.
Are you saying I'm supposed to collect the full 4+gallons of wort from the mashtun?..and that I'm not supposed to add water post boil to the carboy to reach the full volume? If that's so this is a major news flash to me.

Yes. If you are making a 5 gallon batch of beer, you will collect 6.5 gallons of wort from the mash tun, via the mash and sparge. If you are making 2.5 gallons of beer, you will collect about 4 gallons of wort. And so on.

It shouldn't be a news flash at all- that's the way it's been done for hundreds of years. If this is a new idea, maybe some extract brewing techniques are coming through and mixing up the processes for you? We can definitely help with that, and can walk you through an all-grain brewday process.

My boil off is 1.5 gallons per hour, so you may or may not need more wort depending on your boil off.

 

[Yooper]

I can't watch a 30 minute video to see how someone sparges, as I have other things to do this evening, but if you're fly sparging you're keeping at least 1 inch of wort over the grain and all times while very (VERY) slowly draining the runnings and adding fresh water to the top of the MLT. If you're batch sparging, you're dumping in a whole lot of water at once (in a 'batch') and stirring it like it owes you money. You can't really confuse those two techniques.

Maybe it's a hybrid of those two accepted techniques, in which case a brief description of the technique would be helpful.

If this is a continuation of previous thread, then a merge may be warranted unless it's a new topic?

 

[paperairplane]

You've made a wide range of beer styles and types, which makes it hard to be consistent. Especially with a lot of adjuncts.

You've bought / changed equipment throughout. Which makes it hard to narrow down process.

Doing 3 of the same pale ale should help - definitely take notes. Take hydro readings.

I don't know what flavor "twang" corresponds to - but I am guessing ester / phenol. Both are related to ferm temp and under pitching.

 

[Yooper]

[
RECAP:

- I was noticing off flavors in my lighter ales.
- I'm doing All Grain.

If you are noticing flavors in your lighter ales, it's almost 100% that your mash pH is too high.

I'm guessing you are using water (probably tap water) and that you are not acidifying the mashing water enough to drop the mash pH into the proper range.

It's a super easy fix. Use RO or distilled water, or get a water profile from Ward lab for $26 and see if you can work with your tap water.

My tap water makes awesome stouts, but I can't make a decent lighter colored beer with it due to my high alkalinity (and so, too-high mash pH for those beers).

Water is the cause of most of the issues with these types of off-flavors.

 

[MyCarHasAbs]

I guess if you boiled 3.5 gallons down to 1 prior to adding 4 gallons of water and took the reading before the dilution that might account for the high gravity reading. Once you dilute though you no longer know the gravity. Another measure is needed if the figure is to be of use.

I only added about 1.5 gallons of water to reach 4 gallons. I usually end up with 2.5 gallons of wort post boil.

 

[MyCarHasAbs]

1. I guess a new thread got denied. Oh well. Made to sense to me..

2. I would agree after reading some comments that I'm confusing some techniques learned from extract (adding water post boil to the carboy). I think I've also come to a conclusion that you can't go completely off the directions that come with these kits. More than half of the important steps are NOT mentioned.

3. Sounds like my next investment should be a bigger kettle after I watch some more vids from Northern Brewer. As for my method of rinsing the grains, the guy I watched in the vid def seemed to know his sh*t.

For those who do not want to skim through a 30 minute video I'll break down the sparging process that I've been doing.

1. heat up additional volume of water to about 165-170F.
2. Use a large measuring cup to scoop out the water and sprinkle ontop of the grains through a pasta strainer.
3. replace lid back on top of mash tun
4. add more water to heat up and repeat until X amount of volume is collected.

Following that breakdown, my next comment may come off a bit smart assed so I apologize in advanced because I do not intend it to come off that way. But, if that method I'm describing is in correct, then how do you explain the Chocolate Stout I made a few months ago? It turned out so good I served it at my employers' monthly Beer Friday. Not saying anybody's wrong, just saying it seems to be working..

If all I need is to watch a few more vids and get a new kettle then no biggie. Tax return was quite nice this year.